California's Latest Bad Idea — Outlaw Gas-Powered Cars

Global Warming: California is considering a ban on the sale of gasoline-powered cars. If state officials go this route, it will have little effect on CO2 emissions, but will harm consumers and kill California's economy.

The head of the California Air Resources Board told Bloomberg News that the state is seriously looking into whether and how to make internal combustion engine cars illegal in the state, as part of its self-imposed plan to cut state CO2 emissions in 2050 to 80% of what it emitted in 1990.

That follows announcements over the summer that the UK and France will try to ban the sale of gas- and diesel-powered cars by 2040. More recently, China claims it will impose a ban in 2030.

The CARB's Mary Nichols says California could implement such a ban in 13 years, and one state lawmaker plans to introduce a bill that would enforce it in 2040.

To put it bluntly, this is one of the most ill-conceived public policy ideas in a state that seems to have them in abundance.

First, some perspective.

According to the EPA, all transportation — cars, trucks, planes, trains and boats — are responsible for about a quarter of the nation's CO2 emissions. The share contributed by passenger cars alone is considerably smaller than that. In the European Union, for example, cars account for 12% of CO2 emissions.

California's move would make no noticeable dent in global CO2 emissions. Plus, it would take well over a decade before the entire car fleet turned over to all electric.

What's more, the CO2 reduction claims from such a ban are wildly exaggerated.